This article was originally published by Sara Tipton at Tess Pennington’s ReadyNutrition.com
Tess is the author of The Prepper’s Blueprint: How To Survive ANY Disaster
Vitamin D is an essential nutrient and one that can be synthesized by our body when sunlight hits our skin. But during the winter when we are curled up by a warm fire sipping hot cocoa, it can be hard to get enough vitamin D to keep the body running in tip-top shape.
Vitamin D is a precursor hormone and has multiple roles in the human body. It helps to maintain the health of bones and teeth, support the health of the immune system, brain, and nervous system. It also helps regulate insulin levels and aid in diabetes management. Vitamin D also supports lung function and cardiovascular health while influencing the expression of genes involved in cancer development.
Researchers in clinical studies had tested fifty-five adults between 18 and 65 with artificial light sources containing ultraviolet radiation or UV rays. The adults participating in this study were told to sit under a heat lamp or UV light in their underwear for up to 10 minutes. Researchers noticed that their vitamin D levels increased afterward. Of course, buying UV lights or heat lamps and sitting around under those lights in your underwear might not be the best or easiest solution for most people.
It is estimated that sensible sun exposure on bare skin for 5-10 minutes 2-3 times per week allows most people to produce sufficient vitamin D, but vitamin D breaks down quite quickly, meaning that stores can run low, especially in winter. In fact, recent studies have suggested that a substantial percentage of the global population is vitamin D deficient partially because of this.
Spending time outside is one way to get vitamin D, but eating a more healthy and balanced diet can help too. Standing outside in the freezing cold in winter attempting to get some vitamin D isn’t comfortable nor is it realistic for many people as a method to beat “cabin fever.” Adults, aged 1-70 need about 600 IU (international units) of vitamin D per day and adults over the age of 71 require 800 IU per day. Some experts say humans need closer to 1000 IU of vitamin D per day. That’s equal to 20-30 minutes in the sun without sunscreen for those with pale skin. While supplementation is perfectly fine (and relatively affordable), sunshine is still free and the best way for you to increase your vitamin D levels.
Supplements are becoming more affordable, and there are several options for vitamin D on the market if you live in a cold winter climate. Try starting lower though, so your body can adapt. Your body does not absorb vitamin D from supplements as well or quickly as it does from the sun, so you will need to take higher doses. Try a 600 IU supplement and gradually increase up to 800 IU. Just one tablespoon of cod liver oil will provide your body with 1,360 IU of vitamin D
If you would like to consume more vitamin D, there are also many ways to boost the essential vitamin by eating. You should eat a sufficient amount of cholesterol. A lack of cholesterol has been shown to cause malnutrition due to the lack of fat-soluble vitamin absorption. You should also make sure you have sufficient vitamin D cofactors such as vitamin K2, magnesium, boron, and zinc.
Some foods that provide a high level of vitamin D are fatty fish, like tuna, mackerel, and salmon. A mere 4 ounces of cooked swordfish contains 941 IU. Other foods which are fortified with vitamin D, like some dairy products, orange juice, soy milk, and cereals are also excellent sources of the essential vitamin. Beef liver, cheese, and egg yolks will also help you boost your level of vitamin D. In order to get enough vitamin D from your food, fish is a good option. Three ounces of cooked salmon has more than 450 international units (IU).
There are risks when attempting to boost your vitamin D levels, and as with anything, consult a doctor if you need to. Excessive consumption of vitamin D (hypervitaminosis D) can lead to over-calcification of the bones and hardening of the blood vessels, kidneys, lungs, and heart. The most common symptoms of hypervitaminosis D are a headache and nausea but can also include loss of appetite, dry mouth, a metallic taste, vomiting, constipation, and diarrhea. However, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has suggested that vitamin D toxicity is unlikely at daily intakes below 10,000 IU per day, but again, consult your doctor if you are concerned about your vitamin D levels at all.
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*This article is for information purposes only and is not meant to diagnose or treat any disease or illness. Consult your doctor if you have major concerns regarding your health and overall well being.
Tess Pennington is the author of The Prepper’s Blueprint, a comprehensive guide that uses real-life scenarios to help you prepare for any disaster. Because a crisis rarely stops with a triggering event the aftermath can spiral, having the capacity to cripple our normal ways of life. The well-rounded, multi-layered approach outlined in the Blueprint helps you make sense of a wide array of preparedness concepts through easily digestible action items and supply lists.
Tess is also the author of the highly rated Prepper’s Cookbook, which helps you to create a plan for stocking, organizing and maintaining a proper emergency food supply and includes over 300 recipes for nutritious, delicious, life-saving meals.
Visit her website at ReadyNutrition.com for an extensive compilation of free information on preparedness, homesteading, and healthy living.
FWIW, during WWII pregnant women and their babies were given extra rations of milk, cod liver oil, and orange juice.
Also FWIW, Ive tried my doctor recommended vitamin D supplements during the winter months but have never noticed any benefit from them. Maybe my diet is sufficient by itself. Can vitamin D levels be measured to see if they’re needed or not?
There is a standard blood test for Vit D3
Deficiency is currently defined as 70 ng/ml
I am outside almost every day of the year (living @ 34 degrees North) , and I run in the 30 – 40 range.
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My post got mangled –
Deficiency is currently defined as less than 25 ng/ml
Many natural practitioners like it > 70 ng/dl
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Nature and the Sun provides everything you need. It charges my solar panels, battery bank and gives me light at night.
For those looking for more hygiene off the grid. You can lay down on a lawn chair or blanket on the ground, armpits and crotch areas exposed upward towards the sun and the suns rays will kill the bacteria in those dark moist areas and armpits. The sun is a cleansing machine for long term survival when showers are no longer available.
Municipal water and showering is awful to the human skin. All the chlorine, fluoride, chemicals, and toxics dry out the skin and hair and billions of dollars in health products try to undo that damage. Go take a rain shower or build a rain catchment and storage for showering.
You might want to consider getting you vitamin D through the skin. Applying your vitamin D directly to the skin and into the places where you need it is fast and easy. Since it does not have to go through the digestion process getting you should be able to get a more effective dosage. I use a cream I found sold on amazon
made by Anumed international. AnuMed Vitamin D3 Cream 10,000 IU 3. Highly recommended.
You won’t feel any different from correct Vit D3 from UV sun or lamps or from supplementation. It does it’s massive health work quietly. Your optimum blood level of D3 is 60millionth of a gram per milli-litre of blood. For sun UV you need to be at lower latitudes, sun between 10am and 2pm, every day, with 5 minutes a side.. and longer for darker skin. Similar times for UV lamps. Or supplement with vitamin D3, not synthetic D2 as that’s toxic and almost has no effect. You need up to 8000iu D3 daily to reach optimum blood levels.
The RDAs for all vitamins are completely fake. Your Doc will even advise not to supplement, but get if from food which is more baloney. Sun can cause skin cancer as the bad rays penetrate too deeply, while he good ones give D3.
Test Post.
I have tries to post this twice and both disappeared.
How To Beat ‘Cabin Fever’: Easy, have all your favorite prepper videos already downloaded from YouTube. How you ask?
VideoGrabby: Just paste the URL, of the page that has the YouTube video you want, into the text box on VideoGrabby’s website.
Create a video library of SHTF information!
Your posts are being killed because we have a low tolerance for spamming unrelated information about links or “apps”.
exactly how will your advertised er I mean suggested product help with a vitamin D deficiency?
Most of the home remedies and supplements just don’t do anything. However, this is not true in all cases.
Vitamin D becomes more important the older you are. Over 55, take D3, 5000 AU. They come in clear yellow caplets. Bottles can be bought in any drug or grocery store. Take one in the morning. They really do the job.
If you see your doctor regularly they will be notified of any vitamin deficiencies in your blood test results.
My B-12 was low from working indoors too much. My doctor gave me a shot.
These were the two areas I had problems with. Some are gender specific.
Many women have iron deficiencies starting as soon as they start having menses.
That’s the amount of D3 that I take per my doctor’s order. Mine was incredibly low when she checked it some years back. I felt so much better within a week or so after taking capsule with that amount in it.
There are a large number of home and natural remedies that do indeed work. There are a lot of scams in the “supplement” category, I do not consider “supplements” natural or home remedies, although in some cases I suppose they could qualify. There are many natural remedies that work as well or in some cases better than big pharma.
Put a heat lamp in your bathroom. When taking a shower it keeps you as warm as a baby chick.
☀️ ? sunshine is very essential to good health. Nitric Oxide, in sunshine, lowers blood pressure and gives off good vibes and a feeling of well being. Take a walk in the snow, just a little sunshine on your face makes you feel ?. Makes you feel fine.
Open the curtains and blinds as soon as you emerge from sleep. When the real light ? of the ☀️ hits your ?, it stimulates your ?. You will feel more awake all at once and can avoid the morning grouchy feeling so many people complain about. Teach this to your ?.
Your ?.
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It’s also worth considering sleeping with the blinds open so upon waking you can see the first light. OTH, if you are an early riser, take a moment to see the sunrise. If it’s cloudy and can’t be seen well (or at all), it’s still a good time to reflect upon the day’s plans. There is something amazing and awesome about dawn. Or it could just be the artistic side of me showing.
At high latitudes, you cannot make vitamin D from sun exposure in the Winter. UVB just doesn’t penetrate the atmosphere when the sun is low in the sky. Supplements are definitely recommended.
Vitamin JD is better.
The obesity problem deserves #1 enemy of the people status.
Learn to eat real food and you’ll never need a pill. What are real foods? Unprocessed nuts, seeds, fruits and vegetables. Live a life where you eat within a six hour window and then fast for 18 hours. Plenty of energy, never any pain from overworking or overexercising.
I went shopping today and 95% of the adults were massive globs of fat. I won’t trust anyone who is so fucking stupid to allow themselves to become obese. Neither should you.
Processed foods are the main culprit as a cause of obesity. The percentage of processed foods in the American diet went from 32-percent in the 1980s to over 60-percent today.
Real foods are being replaced with processed foods as a direct result of over-population. There just isn’t enough real food to go around.
We are already being conditioned to get ready for the end of meat. Cows are competing with humans for habitat and housing. Cows are being blamed for Climate Change because of all that cow farting (methane). Scientists have been looking for ways to substitute something else for real food. They are growing hamburger in laboratories.
Even our water is processed. Coke has water processing plants in all their bottling facilities. What are they taking out of the water? What are they putting in?
People are always hungry. People never feel satiated. People are always thirsty.
Artificial flavors. Artificial sugars (AKA “artificial sweeteners”). Artificial milk. Artificial juices. All inert, industrially processed material being passed off as food in your local grocery stores.
People are consuming much more inert material than ever before.
The government lies through their teeth about the situation. They blame the people for their health problems. The government blames the people for everything.
Really, fat people worry about not getting enough vitamin D? BAHAHAHA
People think they are so entitled. They think they deserve real food. Where do they get off? [sarcasm]
Beating “Cabin Fever” is simple but not easy.
The last 2 years we have used NO HEAT in the home, other than the fireplace, and a 1000 watt grow light in an extra bedroom. This meant temps in the mornings at about 50 F.
That means wearing your parka during breakfast.
The solution is fairly obvious. If you go to the gym & exercise for an hour, then go shopping, and notice that you’re SWEATING – Bingo ! That’s the clue.
So the first order of business on cold days is to walk up the hill in the backyard. 1 mile up a 600 foot vertical, one mile down.
When you’re back home the house seems positively warm !
Other people have different backyards, so what you do for the half-hour of exercise may differ.
If you live in West Oakland, or somewhere else where stray bullets may be a part of the environment, you might be walking on a level, but the extra weight of a ballistic vest & ballistic undies will partially compensate.
Yes, I see naked people in cold, Alaskan dirt, and connecting wires to parts of their body, etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8b_lg2z8Nc
I bring this up, because, in some views, the sun is only half of a circuit, in which the body forms a connection with the ground.